Reflection support for adaptive distributed applications

The DART (Distributed Adaptive Run-Time) project is developing an adaptive software environment for general-purpose distributed applications. The goal of the project is to provide a software run-time system that allows application authors to quickly develop distributed software, such as network or World Wide Web software, without having to deal with the details of the distribution technology. DART compile-time and run-time components configure the application execution environments depending on hints provided with the application. An essential feature of the run-time component is its ability to reconfigure, or adapt itself, both to the application requirements and to the system and networking environment. To achieve both distribution and adaptation, we use meta-level object programming techniques and run-time monitoring.